The musings of a totally purple obsessed crafter!!!! You name it, if it's purple I WANT IT!!! I'm a rubber stamping card maker who dabbles with making ATC's, scrap booking and more recently art journaling and canvases! I love to distress and I love to make a mess!!! I'm also pretty obsessed with Christmas and make a lot of cards for the occasion. Check out my blog below and leave a comment if you like what you see ....... thanks for stopping by

Friday, 31 August 2012

Got plans for the weekend? Hope so. After a busy couple of weekends we have nothing at all planned for this one although we shall aim to touch base with the surrogate family and make a date to "do dinner" some time soon, to celebrate the arrival of the surrogate grandson, Zac, who's doing really well now despite a brief return stay to the hospital with his mum.

Not much crafting yesterday, don't really know why .... however, I DID manage to wrap the second present and make the tag for our gorilla loving pal ....

Materials used:

Go Kreate fancy tag cut twice, once from white card and once from Kraft card, to provide a nice clean backing for me to write on, we all KNOW alcohol markers bleed through to the back!.

KanBan gorilla image and sentiment inked in Memento tuxedo black on to the white tag

Alcohol markers used to colour image

Yellow/white bakers twine coloured with a tan marker to lose the stark "whiteness"

I know it's not ever so "craft-y" but isn't he just so cute? I do have a gorilla image that's pretty lifelike but simply couldn't resist using this one instead - maybe next year!

I also moved on to plan B) with my tissue box base. Those of you who read recently about my Inka Gold drying out and my Kaisercraft "coloured water" coat may be interested to see in which direction my tissue box base has turned ....

Well, using a combination of the two above materials blended on a craft mat and applied with a baby wipe we now have this drying off ready to embellish .....

Much better coverage, I think you'll agree. Lovely colour of luna light but didn't want too strong a colour as I used Fresco "pansy" (purple) for the top .... I think it might soon be time to try my new FRANTAGE goodies ...........

Just need to decide on some stamps and "stuff" and, once this is dry, I'll be ready to roll!!!

Last night hubby cooked us a lovely chicken stir fry using a Wagamama lemongrass sauce (which was surprisingly bland till we added plum sauce) with loads of rice ...... the leftover rice went out for the birds and just look at these magpies - have you ever seen such a motheaten pair of birds?

Whilst this cheeky chappy was waiting in line - not sure there was much left though - sorry mate!!

Hubby and a neighbour are headed outside this morning, to complete the marathon job that is cutting the hedge that fronts the three properties. They started it two weeks ago but full bins and boxes stopped play, they figured one trip to the tip was enough!! The guys are going to try to squish the rest of the trimmings back in to the now emptied bins. Here's how it looked at 09:00 this morning - with them luck!

After two whole hours there doesn't appear to much visible change but the front is finished and it IS just the top left now - hubby's been to the tip with one load and the bins are full once more - SUCH a lot of cuttings!

And now for the Friday Funny, this week courtesy of Lilian - thanks mate, you're in the draw! It's kind of topical as we recently heard about the sad death of the subject of this week's funny but I hope you will all still enjoy it! It came to me in e-mail form and is entitled U.S. Astronauts well kept secret!!

NEIL ARMSTRONG'S SECRET, GUARANTEED TO MAKE YOU SMILE

In case you didn't already know this little tidbit of trivia, it might make you chuckle when you read it.

ON JULY 20, 1969, AS COMMANDER OF THE APOLLO 11 LUNAR MODULE, NEIL ARMSTRONG WAS THE FIRST PERSON TO SET FOOT ON THE MOON.

HIS FIRST WORDS AFTER STEPPING ON THE MOON, "THAT'S ONE SMALL STEP FOR MAN, ONE GIANT LEAP FOR MANKIND," WERE TELEVISED TO EARTH AND HEARD BY MILLIONS.*

BUT JUST BEFORE HE RE-ENTERED THE LANDER, HE MADE THE ENIGMATIC REMARK

"GOOD LUCK, MR. GORSKY".

MANY PEOPLE AT NASA THOUGH IT WAS A CASUAL REMARK CONCERNING SOME RIVAL SOVIET COSMONAUT.

HOWEVER, UPON CHECKING, THERE WAS NO GORSKY IN EITHER THE RUSSIAN OR AMERICAN SPACE PROGRAMS.

OVER THE YEARS MANY PEOPLE QUESTIONED ARMSTRONG AS TO WHAT THE 'GOOD LUCK, MR. GORSKY' STATEMENT MEANT, BUT ARMSTRONG ALWAYS JUST SMILED, AND SAID IT WAS A SECRET!.

ON JULY 5, 1995, IN TAMPA BAY , FLORIDA WHILE ANSWERING QUESTIONS FOLLOWING A SPEECH, A REPORTER BROUGHT UP THE 26- YEAR-OLD QUESTION TO ARMSTRONG. THIS TIME HE FINALLY COULD RESPOND.

MR. GORSKY HAD PASSED AWAY AND LAID TO REST, SO NEIL ARMSTRONG FELT HE COULD NOW ANSWER THE QUESTION.

IN 1938, WHEN HE WAS A KID IN A SMALL MID-WESTERN TOWN , HE WAS PLAYING BASEBALL WITH A FRIEND IN THE BACKYARD. HIS FRIEND HIT THE BALL, WHICH LANDED IN HIS NEIGHBOR'S YARD BY THEIR BEDROOM WINDOW.

HIS NEIGHBORS WERE MR. AND MRS. GORSKY.

AS HE LEANED DOWN TO PICK UP THE BALL, YOUNG ARMSTRONG HEARD MRS. GORSKY SHOUTING AT MR. GORSKY.

"SEX! YOU WANT SEX?! YOU'LL GET SEX WHEN ......... THE KID NEXT DOOR WALKS ON THE MOON!"

Thursday, 30 August 2012

Ever had one of those days when you meant to achieve miracles? Yesterday was one of those days .... I fully intended to wrap a present and then crack on with my "homework" - this tissue box but the day got away from me.

First of all .... my fabulous Inka Gold was found to have dried out .... I tried the Kaisercraft gold acrylic but the finish achieved (first coat) was simply that of gold water! Hmmm - on to plan B) I suspect ..... then I decided to wrap presents for two pals so I broke out the gold Kraft paper (wonderful stuff but tricky to sticky!!!) before deciding that a personalised gift tag was in order ....... I STILL haven't wrapped the second present! Ah well, perhaps a job for today then.

Materials used:

Go Kreate tags dies (acquired from Birds in the Barn recently)

Gold card,

White card

Red DCWV Pearlised metallic stack

Sparkle 'n Sprinkle Max (mini) inked using Memento tuxedo black

Alcohol markers to colour

Glossy Accents to simulate glass

Crystal stickles to highlight the "bubbles"

Gold thread to attach to parcel

FOR PARCEL - gold Kraft paper (midpac) and Gold wired ribbon (Costco)

The rather disappointing gold base!

Hubby decided to crack on with our tax forms - for which I thank him from the bottom of my heart! However, he's best left alone whilst doing this and as I had received a text from surrogate daughter2 who said she was home from hospital, where she's been since Sunday (along with her newborn). I decided to head off and make some visits. First off I went to visit my pal, Dorothy, at the short term care home she's in, following a replacement knee and hip earlier in the year. Off I skipped around 2:00 ...... as I approached the facility a poor motorist (and fellow visitor) was wrestling with how on earth to gain access to said care home. As an orderly queue formed the dear soul who was number three in line used her remote!!! and in we all filed. Dorothy was on reasonable form and had her daughter and a friend turn up only about ten minutes after me so we all had a natter. On the way home I decided to swing by SD2's to see how she and Zac were ...... only stayed a short while as I strongly suspect the entire family are suffering sleep deprivation right now.

Got home to find hubby had nearly completed the tax forms so we decided to reward ourselves with a glass of a rather cheeky little red ...... as hubby pulled the cork and I reached for the glasses our phone rang with a neighbour enduring a domestic crisis ......... Unfortunately the neighbour (who has been referred to before) had a mini trauma and enlisted our help...we’re top of the ‘help’ list, apparently. But, on this occasion, she needed the professionals!

Yes, they arrived with sirens and flashing lights too!

FORTUNATELY, no lasting damage or trauma and no firemen were harmed in the course of the crisis!, thank heavens! FYI - there was however one casualty .............. the cheeky little red is no more!!! And, as a footnote .... if you haven't checked your smoke alarm lately, maybe you want to do that TODAY!

Wednesday, 29 August 2012

Been a bit quiet on the blogging front since my return from crafting with a pal - actually enjoyed it so much I've not really been able to settle to crafting on my own. HOWEVER and because I had such a fab break I needed a thank you card and I wanted to use some of my newly acquired stash and so .......

Materials used:

14½cm square 300 gsm scallop edged white card and matching envelope

13½ cm square blue card panel

13 cm square white card panel

Dylusions doodle inked in Memento tuxedo black and stamped once centrally and then twice more off the edge to create a border.

It's so funny because the image I've used from that doodles set was one that I was sure would be sat waiting the longest before getting inked - how weird is it that it got to be inked so soon! Now I just need to ink the mushroom and the leaf spray and that will be the lot inked! On to the Artemio set of birds next perhaps, or the clock, or the bee or the Paper Artsy steampunk images or ......... who knows? The World (as they say) is my oyster (or is it lobster?!?!?!).

Yesterday saw us heading to Gloucester for the afternoon, we had an appointment and afterwards thought we would catch up with a few friends, which was nice. It was a lovely day too ....... quite a change from what we woke up to this morning ..... even the birds were trying to get out of the rain! We had four blackbirds enjoying the leftover croissants beneath our patio table - no photos as there was more table than blackbirds! However, they were joined by two of the most bedraggled pigeons who sought shelter on our bird table!

And, since it IS Wednesday and since I WAS set homework whilst with my pal in Essex, I though I SHOULD share where I've got with this project .... I had some fabulous gold paint (Inka Gold) I had planned to use on the base of the tissue box but ..... when I took the lid off I found out that it had dried up and was totally unusable - I TRIED my Kaisercraft gold acrylic paint but, as you can see it's like gold water! On to plan B) Whatever that will be!, sorry teach!, my homework may be a little later than planned.

Oh and I MUST share one last photograph from my few days away with my crafting pal, Lauren, as she coined a phrase that amused me so much I wanted to share.

As I played with Bert's ears like motorbike handlebars .... THE BERTORBIKE" was born!!! - thanks for that Lauren!

Bank Holiday Sunday has dawned both fine and bright ..... and totally unexpected, especially after the tremendous thunderstorms of yesterday!! YIKES! Hubby's gone flying this morning - there's a surprise!

Stand by for a slightly photo heavy post!!

If you checked in with my blog yesterday then you will know that my hubby and I have enjoyed a few days away with friends. It was lovely, we left on Wednesday and made good time to Essex - even managing a swift drive by shop at the local craft emporium, Imagine That, where I snagged the Dylusions set I have been after since the Newbury Art Stamps show in July, along with a rather tasty sentiment set.

It was a lovely evening so we set off to walk the ½ mile to the restaurant for a fab Indian meal and all headed home stuffed to the brim a little while later.

Thursday morning saw us tucking in to one of the few "full English" breakfasts that we allow ourselves each year - delicious!, before heading back to meet up with our friends. The "guys" headed off to Clacton, for the air show whilst Lauren and I walked back up to Imagine That to take a look at a couple of completed SMASH books as Lauren had set her sights on one of those ..... of course, NOW she's got loads planned in her head!! Then it was back for a couple of hours crafting before we were due to drop one of her sons at the local college where he was set to enrol - having achieved the required grades for the courses he wants to study this coming two years - well done and good luck, Andrew.

We HAD planned to visit the Artbase shop in Hornchurch but found it to be closed down - not sure whether it's even still operating as an on-line store either - such a shame. Nipped back home (Lauren's - not mine!) and on to the internet and found another in South Ockenden which professed to be open on Thursdays according to its site .... guess what? A hand made note on the door declared them to be closed for two weeks! Grrrrrrrrrr, no crafty shopping for us so back to Lauren's for yet more crafting - worked for us though we did adjourn to the garden for a glass of wine and then a second and that was us done really!

Using a Sizzix die, the new crunchy wax Kraft paper, pan pastels and a brad from Costco

Crystal stickles - not that it shows in the photo but, trust me, there's sparkle there!

Of course, it's not finished yet but ......

The guys really enjoyed their day out too - to the tune of over 100 photographs (including one SIX minute video!) so here are some edited highlights of their day too

Wing Walking? Don't think it's for me!

This is the same type of plane the Red Arrows formation team fly

Highlight of the day was a flight by the last airworthy Vulcan in the U.K.

They were pretty tired after such a full on day so we ordered a few pizza's and bits and just "grazed", it was a lovely evening so we sat out in the garden enjoying the summer.

Friday saw Lauren's hubby back at work so the three of us set off for Colchester. My hubby had tracked down a model shop and Lauren had found us a craft shop to visit and "satnag" located both for us - so we were happy. Our craft shop (Birds in the Barn) was situated inside an enormous garden centre and was a fab place to visit for a couple of hours - Lauren and I were like kids in a sweet shop and her basket was filling in under a minute!!! Once we'd done with our craft shopping we wandered round the garden centre and found it to have loads of things of interest including a hairdressers, grocery/deli section as well as a nice coffee shop cum restaurant where (once joined by my hubby once more) we all hugely enjoyed their cheese scones! HOWEVER, before leaving we simply had to return to Birds in the Barn where Lauren wanted to pick up just a couple more bargains!! Ooopsie! then it was home to Lauren's once more and she cooked us a delicious Moroccan lamb dish featuring the freshest aubergine (purchased at the garden centre) - and it was during this process that we discovered neither of their three dogs likes aubergine!

Though they sure look keen to try the aubergine, don't they?

Have a great Sunday - I'm off to try to find homes for all my stash and then start on my homework or some challenges ...... this is what Lauren HAD planned we should work on but ........ time just got away from us!!!

The projects we had meant to work on but which have now become homework!!!

Saturday, 25 August 2012

Some of you may have noticed my posts have been a little on the short side ... this is because they've been pre scheduled and hubby and I have been away for a few days.

We've been to Essex to visit some friends, Lauren, Alan and their two boys, three dogs and seven chickens!! Lauren's an obsessive crafter (like myself) and the two hubby's have several interests in common. Imagine our delight when we were able to co-ordinate our crafting few days with one of their shared interests as they headed off for a full day at Clacton Air Show!!! Yee Haa, being able to craft without guilt - always good!

The temporary craft room - aka the dining room!

Let the crafting commence - Lauren shows her new waxed paper flower

After all that crafting it was time to relax over a cool glass!

Here's Bert, the Clumber Spaniel - the baby of the family!

AND we found a few places to visit, mostly hobby related! Imagine That in Upminster, Birds in the Barn on the outskirts of Colchester (within a rather enormous garden centre) and hubby found a model plane to buy too so we were all happy, and the cheese scones at the garden centre were delish too. We dined out a couple of times and in once - mmmmm - spoiled or what! Only down side? The drunks returning "home" to their rooms at the hotel ..... at 04:30 this morning!! A small price to pay and our warmest thanks go to our pals in Essex for their hospitality.

Unfortunately, our journey up had been so good that it came as no surprise that the return journey didn't go as smoothly! The M25 became it's usual car park due to a bad accident this morning and we ended up coming round the north circular to the M4. It was slow all the way home due to sheer volume of traffic and it was good to get home except that, now we're back it's on to the laundry!!

Thursday, 23 August 2012

Made a little gift tag as an alternative to a gift bag for wine - let's be honest, everyone knows what's in them the second they see the bag - don't they?

Materials used:

Strip of light blue card, punched with a 5cm punch.

Offcut from the A4 sheet die cut in to a 3" scalloped circle

2½" circle die cut from white card

White card panel stamped with a dark room door dotty image using versamark ink and then phthalo blue pan pastel applied and set using fixative before attaching the panel to my blue punched panel

Fiskars ribbon threading punch used across the bottom and blue and white polka dot satin ribbon threaded through ready to loop around the bottle and tie in a bow

On the white die cut circle I stamped the Anita's sentiment in Memento Paris dusk and then, using a Hobbycraft leaf image I stamped multiple times around the edge using versamark ink before applying phthalo blue pan pastel and setting with fixative

All that then remained was to highlight the stems and leaf veins using crystal stickles and add a bottle!!!

Wednesday, 22 August 2012

Eureka, it's THAT time of the week again .... well, what IS on my workdesk?

Well, I WAS working on a scrap layout of surrogate daughter, husband and their two boys AND a pal had set a sketch challenge using a rather fab sketch AND I had a new set of alphabet stamps .... so I bet you can't imagine what it was on my workdesk then!?!?!?!

It looks better in real life as the photo doesn't really do it justice!

It was Craft Day on QVC yesterday - any of you succumb to any goodies? I looked at the corner punches that seemed fantastic and so much easier than the PATP punches but .... the guy who was demonstrating managed to misalign every one of his cuts which would probably mean that I would too - so I passed on them! There was oodles (and oodles) of card but I have more card than I can probably ever use so I passed on that too. In the end, I bought ..... NOTHING!!

My car was in for an MOT yesterday which, sadly, it failed! BUM! Brake housing corrosion and brake pads, apparently. The garage ordered the parts before lunch from a location in the centre of Bristol ...... unfortunately, the M32 (motorway north out of Bristol) then got closed due to an "incident" adjacent to the motorway. At 16:30 the parts had still not arrived and hubby was sat, patiently, waiting for them to arrive. He rang me so I didn't worry about where he'd got to! Regrettably, a hefty payment was involved but at least I'm legal once again! - oh, and he got home at 17:45!

Have a great Wednesday - I shall be crafting with a pal later! YEEEEEEEEEEEE HAAAAAAAAAA

Tuesday, 21 August 2012

What's the trauma? Well, my car is going in for its MOT this morning and I'm thinking it might not be good news so please keep your fingers crossed for a pass as UGLY's very precious to me (despite the unflattering name)!

I'd never heard of "moos" until a crafting buddy suggested a swap! What is a moo? APPARENTLY, it's a little like an Artist Trading Card but they're only 2.8cm x 7cm, so pretty titchy. I imagined that you would have to be quite creative to find things in a small enough scale so was quite surprised to find that I had quite a number of images that were sufficiently teeny for the job. In the end I selected a recent acquisition as it's always good to have an excuse to get a new image inky! The swap involved making six "moos" and here they are ...

I also edged three sides of the "moo" using the gold ink and the fourth side with the black. Here's a close up of just one of the "moos"

Last evening hubby and I visited surrogate daughter2 and her family. Surrogate daughter 2 gave birth to Zac on August 18th and she and her hubby are the proud parents of this little sweetie ..... now aged TWO whole days!!!

﻿﻿

Surrogate grandson2

﻿﻿Despite being absolutely exhausted Becky (proud mum) was happy to receive visitors and showed remarkable calmness despite the world and his wife wanting to see the "new arrival" - all the best to you both.

Monday, 20 August 2012

What happened to Sunday? I had started a post for Sunday but never quite finished it - today it's irrelevant so I deleted it and am starting again!

SOOOOO hot yesterday and I just couldn't settle to any crafting (Me?) - I KNOW!!! but hey, that's the way it was. I sat sipping chilled drinks much of the day.

This morning has dawned a little fresher (but just a little) so I've taken the opportunity to do my ironing!!

I had thought of visiting my pal who's in respite care in Bristol but having rung to check where she is today I find she's out for the day - hurrah for her, nice day for it, hope she's gone somewhere nicer than just a hospital appointment!

So, on to a modest amount of crafting. I need your help, dear readers, with this one - read on .....

Materials used:

14½ cm square white, 250 gsm card and matching envelope

Cut out circle mask, held in place with post its

Distress Ink in pumice stone sponged in to circle and then sponged again through a mask of small circles (see photo below for a more detailed look)

Close to the Heart grid image inked ink D.I. pumice stone also

A VERY old Inkadinkado Steam train image inked in Memento tuxedo black

I can't help but think there's something missing, aside from a yet to be decided upon sentiment, any ideas?

I'm a floating list manager

About Me

I'm married to an avid radio control model plane enthusiast - every man should have a hobby, especially if it leaves me free to craft without GUILT!!!! We are both free to indulge our hobbies and mine is rubber stamping. Mostly I make cards and ATC's though I've been gradually getting more and more in to mixed media, art journalling and scrap booking!. I'll have a go at most crafts . . . some even more than once!!!

Housekeeping!

Please be advised that all photographs and craft projects (unless otherwise credited) are the copyright property of this particular Purple Princess and may not be reproduced without permission, though I'm happy for you to use my work as inspiration - and would ask that you credit me, with a link to my blog if you are simply CASe-ing my work.